Seeking Submeter Success

By Charlotte Gabriel-Robez, Astrium GEO-Information Services (www.astrium-geo.com), Toulouse, France. Pléiades 1, the first of a dual-satellite Earth observation system designed to deliver 50-centimeter color imaging products, was launched successfully on Dec. 16, 2011, from French Guiana aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket. The 970-kilogram satellite is the result of a decade-long effort by the